UnHappy Ending
by Kid9535
Summary: Just becase the ending isn't happy, doesn't mean it's got to be sad. Set just after Sebastian and Ciel meet. Ciel's adjusting to living with his devil butler. Bedtime scene; span of 4 days. T for A/n swearing. No pairings unless you want to squint


A/n: I am so dead, when my mom finds out I'm writing this at 2.30 in the morning. This longish thing spanned over the length of at least 3 days and I'm not really proud of it. D: But I did work hard! You guys probably won't understand this though, I don't even understand half of what I'm writing most of the time.

The setting is right after Sebastian somehow rebuilds the house and Ciel is getting settled in. First Kuroshitsuji fic. And don't kill me for screwing up the timeline which I totally made up or for making Sebastian tell Ciel a bedtime story. I like those. And I spent a long time making this one up. And before you ask, yes it is a parallel to Ciel's past.

Disclaimer: Don't own Kuroshitsuji.

**UnHappy Ending**

"Then, I shall take my leave," Sebastian placed his hand over his chest and bowed gracefully. As he turned to go, he heard a soft rustling of sheets and felt a tiny grip on his sleeve. He turned back with a mildly surprised look, the young master, eyes peaking out from under his covers, had snuck a small hand from the side to grasp onto Sebastian's sleeve.

It was the childish innocence displayed by one who had shown such advanced maturity only days earlier that made Sebastian lightly chuckle. The steadfast gaze was locked onto Sebastian, the voice that would not leave the young master's throat, still unused to giving orders even after two days. Sebastian decided to humor the young master, kneeling down beside the bed and softly inquired as to his wish.

The mismatched eyes held their gaze on Sebastian, resolute yet hesitant on revealing the order. The young master wanted something, but as to what, Sebastian could not quite place, he was not a mind reader after all.

"If there really is nothing you need," Sebastian left the whimsical sigh hanging and dislodged the young master's hand from his sleeve. However the young master just reattached himself to Sebastian's sleeve, refusing to let go.

"N-no…" it came out as a whisper. "Don't go."

The surprised look melted into a smirk and Sebastian pulled up a chair. "What would you like me to do then?"

The young master froze, he hadn't thought of that it seemed. Asking a stranger to sing a song was too impersonal and he still wasn't comfortable with a stranger touching him, scars from the recent events remained and his skin would continue to throb for months after. He lifted his gaze, "A bedtime story. Read me a bedtime story."

10 years old and in need of a bedtime story? Well children did need comfort the most.

"But," a tiny voice broke through his thoughts. "I don't want, a happy ending."

"You want a sad ending?" Sebastian furrowed his brow, what a strange child. Perhaps it was the rebound effects of the torture he had suffered the past month up till now that he was convinced happy endings didn't exist. No, he should be more concerned on finding them, shouldn't he? That's why he was summoned. Or so he thought.

"No, I-" the young master broke off, unsure of what to say. "Okay then, a happy ending."

Sebastian smiled, "Okay. Once upon a time, there was a little boy who had everything any little boy could ask for. Loving parents, toys of all sorts, candies of all kinds, whatever he asked for he got, yet he was never selfish nor demanding. He had many friends and he was not impartial to social classes even if he was the son of a rich merchant. He shared his toys and candies with his friends and they played fun games together. He could wake up each morning with a smile on his face and a statement upon his lips 'All's right with the world'."

The young master seemed enraptured with the tale Sebastian had spun and inclined his head slightly in interest, closing his eyes to imagine the scene. However, not even a sliver of a smile crossed his face, he was fully aware of the irony of the story and chose to ignore it, if only to satisfy his childish fantasies.

"Indeed, all was right with the world, until one fateful day an evil demon rose from the ground, hell-bent on creating destruction and grief upon humanity." The young master stopped him there, "You should change characters, or I'll end up misunderstanding and do something I hope never to do." Again the young master surprised Sebastian with his maturity, so he smiled and amended the character.

"A witch, then. A witch arrived one day, cackling as she rode through the night sky on her hand-whittled broomstick. The silhouette of the knobs on her broom showed clearly against the light of the moon. She sent a plague upon the village where the boy lived and killed all of the villagers immediately. As a cruel joke, she spared the boy and captured him back to her castle to be her slave. Everyday she would mock him, treat him like the fallen prince of a conquered kingdom and conduct evil experiments on him as a way to pass the time."

Sebastian paused to regard the young master in order to gauge his reaction. He was surprised to find that the young master was already asleep, chest rising and falling in time to his breaths. The next day the young master would have to meet his Aunt Angelina and he needed his rest to do so. After all, meeting one's relative after a life-changing month should require one to be presentable.

Though, Sebastian lightly touched the bandage over the young master's right eye which concealed the contract and the scars that came with it. Forming a contract on one's body was like a permanent brand being imprinted onto the skin and though it wasn't excruciatingly painful, it stung. Quite a bit, actually.

Sebastian smirked, quietly blowing out the candles he left the room.

"The days dragged on like this, day after day the boy was forced to suffer through these corporeal experiments that blood his blood searing hot and his skin icy cold." The young master was unusually cooperative tonight. Perhaps because he was looking forward to the continuation of the tale? Sebastian thought wryly. He had not put up a fight when Sebastian had changed his bandages or gently washed his back. Unusually submissive for one who was in such adamant denial of his fate.

Today's events could also have contributed to the young master's behavior. As expected, the lady Sebastian now knew to be dubbed as Madam Red had paid the young master a visit. She had prodded him with many questions while the young master had just sat there, refusing to say a word, only acknowledging her presence. As Sebastian served the tea, he noticed the young master flinched a lot less when he passed him and he seemed to really enjoy the taste of the mint chocolate cake he specially baked.

Madam Red herself had regarded him with a wary eye, cautiously asking the young master where he had come from, what was his name etc. Sebastian was amazed at how easily the young master managed to handle all her inquires while barely skimming the surface of their history and keeping her satisfied all at the same time.

He had chosen an interesting master indeed.

However, he knew even the young master had noticed how disappointed Madam Red looked, under the immense relief she obviously felt that her only nephew was alive, there was something else hidden in those eyes of hers. She was dissatisfied with only the young master's return, she wanted his parents back too. The young master knew, and his sadness only doubled, but his face was devoid of emotion, certain he would not reveal any of his true depression to his closest relative. But Sebastian could tell, he saw how the young master quietly suffered on the inside.

"Why did you stop?" The young master glared up at him, with all te impatient of a 10 year old child. "Keep going." Sebastian gave him a joking exasperated look and continued.

"He was kept in a dirty cage in the corner, a curtain draped over the bars so that he could see neither sunshine nor moonlight. He wasn't even sure of the number of days that had passed. He just knew that it was eternal. Everyday he would pray, pray to the God that had never spoken to him in his life, to the one he had never seen before, to his parents who were long dead, to the friends he thought would never leave him, prayed that they would come save him.

"They never came.

"Slowly but surely, his every drop of purity became tainted with the cruel experiments, his humanity drained out from the body he now acknowledged as a shell."Again the young master's muffled snoring broke him from his story. He had been observing the young master this time, it took a shorter time for his eyelids to begin to droop and for his breathing to even out.

Sebastian once more took his leave. Tomorrow, Lady Elizabeth, the young master's cousin, childhood friend, and fiancée would be seeing him tomorrow and the young master needed his rest to put on airs for her. Though judging by the looks of how today went, Sebastian highly doubted that the young master Lady Elizabeth once knew, was anything like the young master Sebastian knew.

"One day (or night) he was dragged out of his cage as per usual and the witch forced his head up," Sebastian paused and the young master seemed to furrow his brows in impertinence. He stopped because the young master was finally beginning to open his eyes wider, to see the world more. Up until today, since they had met, the young master was viewing the world through a closed perspective, afraid to open himself again and subject himself to weakness. However, Lady Elizabeth's extreme show of emotions seemed to irritate the young master to the extent that he was shocked out of his dull exterior shell. Brought forth by his friend's distressed crying.

Indeed, Lady Elizabeth was so shell-shocked that the childhood friend she knew had changed so drastically over the past month he had been missing. He had lost his innocence, his optimism, his soul and most importantly, his smile. Oh it was apparent on how she loved and adored that smile, the way she kept pleading with the young master to 'Please, please Ciel-kun, smile again. Just once. Smile!' Until she was so desperate for a reaction that didn't consist of the young master giving her a dead, blank stare that she burst into tears.

Her lady-in-waiting ushered her away while Sebastian waited for the young master to calm down as well, terrified that he had made his dear friend cry.

"Do you need me to order you? Honestly, always stopping in between sentences," the young master mumbled, this time his head was full out of the covers. Stubborness shining through his dead gaze, yet blocked from Sebastian's full view by a clouded look. It seems the young master's true nature was finally beginning to show.

"As I was saying, the witch forced his head up, cackling wickedly. With a gnarled finger, she pointed over to the far-side of the room. There, stood this large and horrifying contraption with every single kind of sharp, pointed or remotely dangerous object strapped to it. With renewed fear the boy thought he'd lost, he screamed and struggled weakly against the witch's grasp. It was futile of course, since he was only supplemented by meager meals that kept him breathing but not alive.

"The witch dragged the boy across the cobbled floor, the boy screaming in fear, for he knew that today was the day he would die.

"He spotted a window he had never thought of jumping through since they were in a tower and gathered up the last of his strength and will and shoved the witch aside. Voice hoarse from screaming but letting loose a shout anyway; he flung himself out of the window, desperate on dying a graceful death than a long slow agonizing one-"

The young master was struggling to stay awake, Sebastian noted. "It's your fault," he heard the young master mutter weakly. "For having such a soothing monotonous baritone." Monotonous? He? Shocked and appalled and- Oh the young master was asleep already. Well, trifles, trifles. Sebastian hoped he could invent more good things by the next night fall.

The next day would be a quiet one, a time for the young master to brood and think over what he would and could do in the future. And to take the time to consider the responsibilities he now held, as current owner and head of the Phantomhive manor. The only one left to uphold the Phantomhive's glorious name.

"I'm ready for bed." The young master knocked on Sebastian's door just 15 minutes before he was about to head up to usher the young master to bed. A day of brooding and well-brewed tea and the young master had changed so much, the young master never ceased to surprised Sebastian, even after 4 days. Sebastian usually had a human figured out in two days. But this was a child he was dealing with and children learnt everyday. This time, the young master had learnt what responsibility really tasted like and what decisions could do.

His bold statement showed how sure he was of himself and Sebastian detected a surly change in his demeanor. No more did the young master shy his eyes away from Sebastian, instead meeting his gaze straight-on. He was developing a cocky stance and building up his defenses so that no one could hurt him anymore.

As of tomorrow, the young master would be the proud owner of a newly invested company, the Funtom Toys and Confectionary Company. Little children had big plans after all, and the young master lacked neither the brains nor the brawn to carry it out, unlike other children. Sebastian smiled to himself as he carried the young master up to his chambers, things would get a lot more interesting soon.

Once the young master was comfortably tucked in, the usual chair was pulled up and Sebastian began his tale again.

"Instead of hitting a hard rocky ground headfirst, he found his body cushioned by something feathery soft but before he could discern what it was, he blacked out. When he awoke, he found himself parallel to the ground and surrounded by darkness, darkness that moved and spoke. The boy thought that God had caught him when he fell, but it seemed that God had failed him once again. But he found that he didn't quite mind.

"The darkness weaved around him, soothing his wounds, at the same time he felt his life-force being slowly drained from his body. He had become so used to the pain that he was completely numb to this feeling, the emptiness that slowly overcame his senses. He also felt a strange warmth that pressed against his side. A small sleek black cat with glistening eyes purred as it rubbed against his body. Slowly the darkness shrank away from the boy and was absorbed into the cat's sleek body. Until only the boy and the cat were left sitting there in the middle of a field at midnight-"

"Wait-" the young master interrupted. "We're close to the end right?" Sebastian nodded, briefly wondering what kind of thoughts were running through his strange master's mind. "I've decided, I don't want a happy ending."

Sebastian straightened, once again his master had surprised him with these sudden decisions and the maturity that he held within his childish behavior. "I want an ending which will decide itself when the time comes. I had insisted upon avoiding happy ending since the tale began because now I know happy endings are lies that can't ever come true. Humans aren't supposed to know their fate, but they can make the choices to decide it. I want an ending I can choose." Sebastian stared for a moment at this man stuck in a child's body, glaring defiantly at him, the sign of the contract usually concealed behind a closed eye now facing him with no fear. And his lips parted with glee.

"The boy stood up, his body feeling lighter than it usually did. He stretched for a moment, regarding the cat with an inquisitive eye. He shrugged and set off into the horizon, to find a happier ending, the small sleek black cat following closely at his heels. 'All's right with the world, as it can get' he whispered into the wind, and the cat meowed, as if reinforcing that statement."

The young master was asleep as Sebastian replaced the chair back to the corner of the room. As he was leaving the room, half in, half out of the door, he heard the young master mumble in his sleep 'All's right as it can get'.

And he blew out the candles.

A monologue could be heard echoing the corridor outside the master bedroom of the Phantomhive estate. "Tomorrow will be a nice day to take a walk. The young master needs the exercise."

End

A/n: I am SUPER rusty. I haven't written much since Nanowrimo which I totally lost. 40k. Yup, loser. Please review and don't harp on the issue that the title sucks. I know it does. I can't think of anything else other than Ruined Fairytale. (Come to think of it, UnHappy Ending is damn cheesy D:)


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